1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a television with disc loader for taking in discs such as DVD, and a disc presence display device mounted on equipment such as television.
2. Description of the Related Art
In a disc compatible image equipment such as a DVD player integrated television, a disc loader for taking the disc inside is built in the equipment main body. Generally, there are various disc loading types such as tray type, slot-in type, caddy type, shell type and the like, but the tray type and the slot-in type are mainly adopted for television and the like. The tray type is a type in which the disc is placed on a tray and conveyed inside, wherein the tray is pulled out by a button operation to place the disc, and the disc is taken inside with the tray with a further button operation. The slot-in type is a type in which the disc is directly inserted into the slot to be taken inside, wherein when one part of the disc is inserted into the slot, the disc is automatically taken inside by the disc loader. The slot-in type is suitable for a flat screen television having a short depth such as liquid crystal television since it does not involve pulling in and out the tray.
In a case of the tray type, even if one forgets to take out the previously inserted disc, a check can be made whether or not the previous disc has been forgotten to be taken out since the tray is pulled out when inserting a new disc, and thus the problem of accidentally placing two discs is prevented. In the slot-in type, however, a new disc may be inserted even though a disc is left inside the slot since the inside of the slot cannot be visually observed from the outside. This may cause collision or damage of the discs, or damage to the loading mechanism by forced insertion. Thus, a function of detecting the presence of the disc in the slot, and displaying a fact that the disc is present in the slot by turning on or turning off the light emitting element based on the detected result is necessary.
In the slot-in type, when the power of the equipment is turned OFF, if a disc is inserted into the slot, such insertion is simultaneously detected by a photosensor, which then turns ON the power and drives the disc loader to take in the disc. An intermittent pulse light is projected instead of a continuous light from the light projecting element of the photosensor when the power is turned OFF. The pulse light is chosen to save power, and insertion of the disc can be detected even with the pulse light. However, if the light projecting element is pulse driven when the power is turned OFF, the output of the photosensor is a pulse output when the disc is not inserted in the slot while the power is turned OFF, and thus the light emitting element displaying the presence of the disc flashes, which may cause the user to mistakenly recognize or fear that the equipment has broken down, or mistakenly recognize that the disc is present and mistakenly perform reproducing operation or recording operation even though the disc is not present.
An in-vehicle CD player is disclosed in Japanese Laid-Open Utility Model Publication No. 5-21397 in which two light emitting diodes having different light emitting colors are arranged, wherein one light emitting diode is lighted when the disc is inserted, and the other light emitting diode is lighted when the disc is not inserted to allow the presence of the disc to be recognized by the light emitting color. In this relevant document, mistaken recognition of the presence of the disc is prevented, but the cost increases since two light emitting diodes are necessary to display the presence of the disc. Further, since this relevant document proposes to detect the disc with a switch that turns ON when chucking the disc, and not to detect the disc with the pulse light when the power is turned OFF, a solution to the problem of mistakenly recognizing with the flashing of the light emitting diode as described above is not given.
In the television with disc loader adopting the slot-in type, when pulse driving the light projecting element for disc detection when the power is turned OFF, if the presence of the disc is displayed with one light emitting diode, the light emitting diode flashes when the disc is not inserted in the power OFF state, and the user may mistakenly recognize breakdown or that disc is present.